Profiles Of The Candidates Running For The Illinois Supreme Court

March 08, 1992

Here are the candidates running in the March 17 primary for the Illinois Supreme Court in the state`s 1st Judicial District, which is Cook County:

Democrats

Edna Selan Epstein, 53, a South Side resident, is a lawyer in private practice. She was an assistant state`s attorney in Cook County and a partner at Sidley & Austin before leaving in 1989 to start her own firm.

Epstein has proposed administrative reforms and has attacked what she calls the ``incestuous relationship`` among politicians, judges and the larger lawyer groups.

Michael J. Howlett Jr., 43, a Near West Side resident, is a former associate judge who left the bench in 1986 to run for lieutenant governor with Adlai E. Stevenson III on the Illinois Solidarity Party ticket. He is now a trial lawyer handling complex litigation. He also has been active in a program that provides help to lawyers with substance abuse problems.

Howlett says the state Supreme Court in the past has not focused enough attention on administrative leadership and emphasizes the need to improve educational programs for judges.

Blanche M. Manning, 57, a South Side resident, has been a state Appellate Court judge since 1987. She has been on the bench since 1979 and held administrative positions during her years as a Circuit Court judge.

She believes the state Supreme Court should take a stronger public position that judicial corruption will not be tolerated. She also says justices should implement administrative reforms to reduce court backlogs in Cook County.

Mary Ann G. McMorrow, 62, a Northwest Side resident, has been an appellate judge since 1985. She was a Circuit Court judge from 1976 to 1985 and was the first woman to prosecute serious crimes for the state`s attorney`s office in the late 1950s.

McMorrow notes she has been a judge longer than any of the other candidates and suggested at an Appellate Lawyers Association forum last month that ``sitting as a Supreme Court justice should not be a learning-on-the-job type of experience.`` She also advocates court reforms.

Jill K. McNulty, 56, a Near South Side resident, has been an appellate judge since 1990. She has been on the bench since 1979 and spent more than six years in Domestic Relations Court.

She also has been critical of what she sees as the Supreme Court`s failure in the past to wield its administrative authority over the court system. She believes that the terms of chief Circuit Court judges should be limited and judicial assignments should be rotated.

Ellis E. Reid, 57, a Beverly area resident, is presiding judge of Cook County Circuit Court`s 1st Municipal District, which puts him in charge of 100 judges, many of whom preside over high-volume courtrooms in 13 facilities throughout Chicago.

Reid was appointed to the bench in 1985 after more than two decades as an attorney in private practice representing clients ranging from labor unions to former boxer Muhammad Ali to the Ford Motor Co. He has said that judicial ethics rules preclude him from speaking out on issues facing the state high court.

Dom J. Rizzi, 59, of Northbrook has been an appellate judge since 1978. He was the only one of the Democrats not to seek the endorsement of party slatemakers.

During the campaign, he has voiced strong support for a merit selection system of appointing judges and opposition to the new judicial districts in Cook County for electing some circuit judges. He also has called for Supreme Court to appoint an inspector general with subpoena power to look into corruption.

John P. Tully, 56, a Southwest Side resident, has been an appellate judge since 1990. Tully was elected to the Appellate Court in the same election that saw voters oust him as a Circuit Court judge. Tully says he concentrated on running for the Appellate Court and wasn`t really interested in seeking retention.

He has waged a populist-style campaign, shunning screening by the larger lawyer groups because he says they oppose his candidacy. ``I think judges should have to go out and ring doorbells,`` Tully told appellate lawyers at the group`s forum last month.

Republicans

Themis Anagnost, 78, a Northwest Side resident, is a lawyer in private practice who won a legal battle to remain on the ballot in the primary. A Cook County elections board had ruled Anagnost off the ballot because he is older than the state`s mandatory retirement age for sitting judges. But a Circuit Court judge said the law does not apply to candidates.

Robert Chapman Buckley, 68, of Arlington Heights has been an appellate judge since 1982. During more than 30 years on the bench, Buckley has been a part-time police magistrate, an associate judge, a full circuit judge and an appellate judge. He was endorsed by GOP slatemakers.

Here are the state Supreme Court candidates running in the 2nd Judicial District, which includes Du Page, Lake, Kane, McHenry and nine other counties across northern Illinois: